The Air Force Discharged This Woman For Getting Pregnant And Now Wants Its $92K Back

CNN reported
today that a single woman who was discharged from the Air Force
and asked to pay back her $92,000 ROTC scholarship after she
revealed she was pregnant is fighting
her dismissal.

Rebecca Edmonds was finishing up her nursing
degree at Marquette University when she found out she was
pregnant.

She received her commission but failed to tell
the Air Force about her condition until she arrived at her first
duty station. By then she was two-thirds into her pregnancy and
there was no turning back.

Each tells the sad tale of a practicing Catholic, daughter of a
Navy officer, who just wants to serve her country but was told
single parents aren't welcome. The information she's pushing the
hardest--that if she had terminated the pregnancy, she could have
kept her commission and would still be an officer.

It's true, that the military doesn't want single parents. On the
Air
Force recruitment site, when you start an application, if you
hold your mouse over the question "Are you a single parent?" it
says, explicitly:

"An applicant is ineligible when he or she is an unmarried
applicant who has physical or legal custody of any family members
incapable of self-care. The applicant does not have the
flexibility required to perform worldwide duty, short notice TDY,
remote tours, and varied duty hours."

At times the military hasn't even wanted married parents. A
2008 USA Today story reported that male, married Marine
recruits who were fathers were 10 percent more likely to drop out
of boot camp--making them less desirable than those with criminal
records.

Edmonds was not completely without options. If she had notified
superiors of the change in her medical condition, as she signed a
contract promising she'd do, the Air Force wouldn't have accused
her of fraud. She could have given custody of her son to her
parents, who told CNN they would have taken care of him if their
daughter deployed, anyway. She could have married her boyfriend,
the father of her child.

A commenter, Milliepede, raised
an interesting point under the Daily Mail's story: "Oh, and don't
even use the "I'm a Catholic and don't believe in abortion" card.
If you're having pre-marital sex and having children outside
marriage - THAT IS NOT CATHOLIC [capitalization by commenter] and
she shouldn't be portraying herself as such."

It is also worth noting that none of the three stories mention
whether Edmonds was using contraception.

Karen Edmonds, Rebecca's mother, is trying to make this about all
single women in the military, telling CNN that when Secretary of
Defense Leon Panetta said, in regards to the repeal of Don't Ask
Don't Tell, that he was committed to "removing all the barriers
that prevent Americans from serving their country," it should
have also applied to single mothers.

But it's not remotely the same. A gay soldier can't avoid being
gay. A single soldier can prevent getting pregnant.